Black Promises: A Dark New Adult Romance Read online

  “The asshole’s house is that way,” I said and pointed straight ahead by way of explanation. She frowned, squinting.

  “We’re on the other side of those woods, right?”

  “Exactly. This neighborhood developed the other half of the forest. I had to check a few maps, but if we go between those two houses and straight through, we should hit Silver’s place straight ahead.”

  She frowned around. “Is that a good idea?”

  “Come on.” I strode ahead and she hurried to keep up. “I scoped this out already. No motion detector lights and no outdoor security cameras. House on the left has a dog, but if he’s inside—” I paused, listening, but didn’t hear the big, fat beagle sniffing around. “—then we should be fine.”

  I stalked forward. Cora struggled to keep up. I could tell she had more questions, but she kept her mouth shut as we walked down the front lawn right along the line that split the two houses. The yard on the left had a big wooden fence, and I stuck close against it. Nothing happened as we reached the edge of the woods then slipped into the forest, stomping through the underbrush.

  It was dark as fuck. Cora cursed as she stumbled over something. I caught her, made sure she was steady, then continued. “I wish we had a light,” she whispered.

  “Can’t do lights. Someone might see.”

  “What are we coming this way for? Wouldn’t it be faster to park on the other side?”

  “Faster, yes, but more obvious. Did you notice the difference between the neighborhood we parked in and the place where Silver lives?”

  She hesitated. “That neighborhood’s bigger. Lots more people and cars in the street. And it’s not as nice.”

  “Exactly. They’re used to trucks parking wherever, but not Dr. Silver. He’d notice a piece of shit like mine. Now come on and be quiet.”

  I led her in the general direction of the good chiropractor’s house. I wasn’t sure I headed in the right direction, but the moonlight slipped through the trees, and I kept moving straight ahead as much as I could.

  We stumbled onto a path after ten minutes. It was narrow, but it wound in the right direction. I followed it, figuring this might be a hiking trail the good doctor used. Cora stuck close against my side and the forest felt ominous, enormous and pitch dark, filled with creatures of malice and hate—or maybe that was just my own mind. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference.

  “That’s it,” she whispered suddenly.

  I saw it then. A flicker of lights between the tree trunks. I hurried on and we grew closer and closer, and she was right—I recognized the back of the house from the satellite images I studied earlier today.

  Dr. Silver had a black iron fence around his property. There was a pool with chairs all around it and a small pool house to the right. It was extremely nice and very well lit, and I guessed the small white protrusions hanging down from the soffit vents were motion-detecting security cams. They typically had a limited range, say fifty feet, so we’d be fine if we kept back.

  I crouched down at the edge of the woods. The fence line was ten yards away, and the house another forty yards further.

  “What do we do now?” she whispered, leaning forward on her toes, staring at the house intently. Every fiber of her body strained in that direction, and the man we planned on killing was inside, right this second, probably alone.

  We could do it now if we wanted.

  But no, not yet. I came out here to scout the location, but also to do something else.

  I turned to her suddenly and pushed her backwards. She let out a surprised gasp as she slammed down into the leafy, rock-strewn grass. I straddled her, pinning her wrists down above her head, holding her still as she tried to struggle, her face showing fear, and shock, and something else.

  Excitement? Desire?

  I leaned forward and whispered in her ear, “Stop fighting me, freak.”

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “One last test.”

  She sucked in a breath then slowly let it out. “What the hell are you thinking? You scared the crap out of me.”

  “Good. I want you scared. We’re about to do a very scary thing.”

  “Get off me.”

  “Not yet.” My lips brushed her neck. Fuck, she was so tempting. I could take her right here and now—rip her virginity from her tight, beautiful body.

  But that wasn’t the deal, and I kept my word.

  She glared at me defiantly. She was at my mercy and she knew it, and yet she wasn’t letting it show.

  “What do you want from me?” she asked, chin tilting up. “You got your contract. How much more do you need?”

  “There’s a difference between wanting something hard and doing it. Do you have any idea how much blood comes out of a human body?”

  She shook her head. “No, I don’t, and I don’t care. Dr. Silver—”

  I moved my lips to brush against hers. She stopped talking, tongue pressing against her teeth.

  She wanted me to kiss her. I bet if I reached down between her legs, I’d find her dripping wet.

  My little freak wanted me to fuck her rough here and now.

  “You want me to kill him, but actually seeing it happen is going to be pretty fucked up. Bodies are ugly and disgusting, especially when you tear them apart. He’s a monster, but he’s still a living human being, and taking a life is no small fucking thing.”

  “You’d know? You talk like you’ve done this before.”

  “I haven’t, but I’ve fought enough to know what’s going to happen. I’ve seen broken bones and bleeding mouths and heads and eyes and lips. You’re a clean little virgin.”

  “There’s nothing clean about me,” she whispered and struggled, but I held her tight.

  My freak. My lovely, lovely freak.

  “I need to know you won’t panic when the time comes. When I cut his throat or smash his skull, you’re not going to run.”

  “I’m not going to run.”

  “Swear to me. No matter what happens, you’re in this. No matter how ugly it gets.”

  “I swear it. I want this, Jarrod.”

  I wasn’t sure if she meant Dr. Silver’s life—or the prize she’d give me after.

  I released her then. I wasn’t satisfied, but I never would be. She rubbed her wrists and sat up as I reclined beside her. Silence dropped over the night until the back door opened and a dog skittered out into the yard, sniffing around.

  We both froze. The dog was a good-looking yellow Labrador with a perfectly groomed coat and a handsome square face. He sniffed the air and I swear he stared right at me for a few long seconds—

  Then released a bark.

  Cora flinched.

  The dog barked again. And again. I didn’t think it could see us, but maybe it caught our scent. It came closer to the fence, still barking—

  The back door opened again and Dr. Silver himself stepped out. “Hoagie! That’s enough, Hoags. Get inside.”

  Hoagie’s hackles were up. It showed its teeth.

  “Good boy,” I whispered.

  “Hoagie! Come!” Dr. Silver’s tone was sharp.

  Hoagie turned and trotted over. Dr. Silver let the dog inside, grumbling, and slammed the door behind him.

  “Oh, fuck,” Cora said, letting out a breath. She was sheet-white.

  I stood and offered her my hand. “That’s enough for tonight.”

  She took it and I led her back into the woods.

  “How the hell are we getting past that dog? He knew we were out here. There’s no way we’ll get inside.”

  “Don’t worry about that. I’ve got a plan.”

  “You keep saying you’ll figure it out, but I haven’t seen anything yet.”

  I snorted and smirked at her. “Do you have any better ideas? From what I can tell, you’ve been daydreaming about killing this asshole for years, but you haven’t done a quarter of the leg work that I’ve done in the last week.”

  She glared at me, but didn’t argue. “You sti
ll haven’t told me how we’ll do it.”

  I sucked in a deep breath and let it out.

  “Three days. We’re killing him in three days.”

  She stopped walking. I went on for a few more paces before looking back.

  “You’re kidding. Three days?”

  “There’s no reason to wait.”

  “There are a million reasons to wait! For example, I still don’t know how you plan on actually killing him!”

  “You don’t need to.” I showed her my teeth in a wicked grin. God, I loved teasing her. Riling her up was part of the fun in all this.

  “Jarrod—”

  I held up a hand. “Relax. I’ll tell you everything before we start. But I need you to be ready in three days. Get yourself mentally set.”

  “Thursday night.” She nodded sharply. “I’ll be ready.”

  “Good.” I began walking again. “No turning back. No changing our minds.”

  “No turning back.”

  She walked next to me, head held high as we followed the path back toward the other neighborhood, and I swear she was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. She glowed like a ghost, like a witch, like a wraith. The moonlight outlined her body in silver and I could’ve sworn she was floating above the ground, her hair lifting into the air like static electricity coursed over her skin, and I wanted to touch her, to reach out and run my fingers along her arms to feel the shock of her presence, but I kept my hands balled into fists.

  Three days to get ready.

  Then that asshole was going to die.

  And afterwards?

  Well, I didn’t know would happen.

  But I hoped it would be fun.

  10

  Cora

  Three days. Three long days. They dragged like years, like millennia.

  Each night, I texted with Jarrod nonstop with my burner. We went over the plan in detail, again and again, and I had to admit that it might actually work.

  It wasn’t perfect. There was room for error, but it wasn’t foolproof.

  This could still go wrong.

  But that didn’t matter.

  When Thursday night rolled around, I put on black jeans, smudged gray and black running shoes, and a black hooded sweatshirt. I waited anxiously in my room for ten, eleven, twelve at night, before sneaking downstairs and out the back door. The house was asleep and nobody heard me walk out to the street, head down a couple blocks, and climb into Jarrod’s truck.

  “Anyone see you?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so. It’s quiet.”

  He squinted at the sky. “Full moon.”

  “That’s good, right? Easier to see?”

  “Maybe.” He seemed grim as he began to drive. He wore all black like me, but somehow it was fashionable on him. The hoodie clung to his massive, muscular chest, and the jeans showed off his well-formed legs and calves. I was probably sick in the head for ogling his body right before we went to murder someone, but I had to admit Jarrod was one hell of a specimen.

  He pulled into the neighborhood. There were more cars than last time and he had to squeeze in behind a minivan. Apparently one of the houses was having a big party, and several people lingered outside.

  Jarrod checked his watch, frowning. “We need to get going.”

  “Maybe they’ll go in soon.”

  “We don’t have time to wait. Silver goes to bed soon.”

  I sighed and followed him out into the night. The young guys sitting outside of their house were busy smoking weed, the smell of it thick and heavy in the air, and none of them bothered to look over as we walked past. Still, they might remember a big guy and a small girl in all black if the cops came asking questions.

  Didn’t matter. We’d come this far and weren’t turning back. Jarrod strode between the houses, and as we skirted the fence on the left, a dog let out a few aggressive snarls and yaps.

  I flinched away. Jarrod grabbed my wrist and pulled me along at a jog until we reached the safety of the forest.

  “Bad luck,” he said softly, glaring back at the houses.

  I was about to ask if he wanted to turn back, but kept my mouth shut. He’d only see that as weakness, and I knew he didn’t trust me already. If he moved forward then I’d go with him all the way to the end.

  He strode on into the underbrush. I kept pace, smacking away small branches. The full moon did help make things easier to see, but only marginally. We found the path after a little bit of walking, and he checked his watch again, the digital face glowing sickly green. Neither of us had cellphones—those could be traced.

  “We’re on schedule.”

  “Are you sure this’ll work?”

  “I’ve been scoping him out every night for the past three nights, and it’s always the same. Trust me, this’ll work. If it doesn’t, we’ll just have spent the evening sitting in the woods staring at his house for no reason. Could be worse.”

  “Yeah, right, could be worse.”

  We walked on in silence.

  I was about to help kill a man.

  The thought kept coming unbidden over and over.

  We were going to murder a human. We were going to take a life.

  Dr. Silver was going to die.

  Jarrod would do the actual killing, but I was a part of this. The plan didn’t work without my help.

  It was hard to fully comprehend. Try as I might, killing Dr. Silver was still an abstraction, despite the reality of the woods, the cold sting of frosty air on my lips, and Jarrod’s looming, muscular form moving like a panther through the blackness. I knew it would happen, I understood on an intellectual level that I was about to see the man’s life leave his body, but I still couldn’t connect all the pieces together to make a whole.

  We reached the edge of the woods and the back of the house’s fence line in silence.

  The back lights were still on, despite the late hour, and the flicker and glow of a television made blue flashes across an upstairs window.

  Jarrod let out a pleased grunt as he crouched down and leaned close. His hands touched my hips and his lips brushed my ear.

  “He does this every night,” he whispered softly, breath warm and chilling. “Sometime in the next half hour, he’ll come down to let Hoagie out. When he does, we’ll draw him out.”

  “What if he doesn’t?”

  “Then we wait and go home and try again tomorrow.” He squeezed me gently. “Have faith. Now stay here and don’t move.”

  “Wait. Are you sure the cameras won’t pick you up?”

  “I’m sure.” He smirked at me, a flash in the night, then crept forward.

  He skirted along the fence, staying as far from the house as he could manage, until he reached a side gate. It was double wide, meant for lawn mowers, but it unlatched and opened easily. Once that was done, he came back and hunkered down.

  I sat next to him, drew my knees to my chest, and waited.

  The night was colder than I expected. The heavy wool sweater beneath my black hoodie wasn’t doing much to keep the chill away, especially while we sat on the frozen ground motionless. I shifted closer to Jarrod and he wrapped one strong arm across my shoulders, tugging me closer.

  I didn’t mean to display some affection and his reaction to my proximity was surprising, but he was like a furnace, his skin giving off so much heat that I began to warm up instantly. I should’ve been more careful—we were out to murder a man, after all—but I liked the feel of Jarrod’s hard, warm body against mine, and I figured it didn’t matter anyway.

  After this, I’d do a lot more than just snuggle with him.

  We waited as the clouds drifted past, covering stars then lazily moving on, their shadows casting long, strange black lines across the otherwise motionless yard. I saw a cat wander between the trees nearby, and heard other animals back in the woods moving through the underbrush.

  If Jarrod noticed anything, he didn’t show it. The man was staring single-mindedly at the back of the house, his eyes narrowed, his f
ace pulled down into a tight frown. It was like he was willing Dr. Silver to do what we wanted and he couldn’t do anything but sit in suspended animation until the man appeared.

  More sounds back in the woods. Any other night and I would’ve been terrified. I wasn’t an outside girl, wasn’t into hiking or camping or whatever, didn’t care about plants and nature in general, and got freaked out in the dark. Sitting in the woods in the freezing cold in the blackest part of the night was exactly the sort of thing I would’ve done anything to avoid. I could imagine all sorts of beasts back there, lurking in the trees: fanged monsters, rabid beasts, starving creatures looking for an easy human to snack on.

  And yet tonight, I was the predator.

  Sudden motion. The back door slid open. The flood lights came out and I had to blink a few times.

  The dog trotted out into the yard.

  The back door slid closed. I never caught a glimpse of Dr. Silver, but I knew it was him.

  Nobody else would be home to let the dog out this late.

  Jarrod moved away and got into a crouch. He looked back at me and nodded.

  I took a small metal whistle out from my pocket and stood. I stayed low, peering over the top of a bush, and pressed the whistle to my lips.

  I blew hard.

  Nothing happened.

  No sound came out, but the dog’s ears perked up.

  It trotted over to the fence and stared out at the woods.

  “Again,” Jarrod whispered.

  I blew again and this time held it longer.

  The dog cocked its head, staring, but it only stood there. It didn’t head for the gate at all.

  I blew again and again, and eventually the dog lost interest. It turned away and peed on the grass before moving back toward the door.

  Jarrod cursed.

  “Stay here,” he growled softly, creeping to the fence.

  “What are you doing?” This wasn’t part of the plan.

  “Keep blowing.” He grabbed a stick and practically crawled toward the open gate.